$200 NL HE Full Ring: Should I have called this hand?

[teepack]

Game

Hold'em

Game Format

No Limit

Stakes

$1/$2

Table Format

Full (8-10 seats)

Currency

$

I think I messed this hand up, but wanted to get feedback. Had As-9d in the BB. Pot limped to me with 4 limpers so I bumped it to $15 and all called. This was typical.

Flop comes Ac-Kh-10c. I bet $20. One player folded. Next player shoved for his remaining $106. Other two folded to me. I had about $200 behind. I didn't think it through as well as I should have and folded. I should have remembered that he initially limped and then called my raise. He turned over Kc-8c for second pair and flush draw.

According to the poker odds calculator, it seems I was about 50/50, so maybe it wasn't a bad fold. If I had been deeper, I would have called, but didn't want to lose more than half my stack.

 

[BigKulpPoker]

With preflop money and your flop $20 bet already in the pot, you don't need better than 50/50 to call a heads up allin, in fact you can profitably call with less than 50% chance to win.

 

[Station_Master]

A9o out of position, I think I would rather just check than squeeze, as it's not a good spot when called as you will often be dominated.

If my maths is right you need to call $86 to win a pot of $287 so you only need 30% equity or so (and everyone else has folded so no future betting rounds). Its close either way I think, you would expect worse not to play this way for value, but he could be on a draw. I think fold is probably the better play but call is not bad.

The error really was the squeeze with too weak a hand (and it probably wasnt big enough if everyone called). The flop cbet is really small but I think that's fine, to get called by pair plus gutshot type combos, though I would often check in these spots as your hand is not that strong.

 

[teepack]

When it limped all the way to me in the BB, I figured my A-9 had to be ahead, but since it's not a real strong hand, I wanted to try to thin the field while also building a pot pre-flop. I achieved the second goal but not the first. Given how many hands had gone like this previously, I probably should have just checked it. A larger bet, like $25, probably would have chased a couple off, but I didn't want to go that big with A9o. I wanted to bet post flop because I figured it would likely check around, and I didn't want to give people with a random Q or J a chance to hit the straight for free and didn't want to give the flush chasers a free card, either. But had I not raised preflop and checked the flop and the dude shoved all-in, I could have easily folded and only been out $3.

 

[Chris Rowbach]

I like checking preflop here. Hope to hit a big flop, otherwise get off cheap.

 

[Chris Rowbach]

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